RUR-print by Zaven Pare

Jana Horáková: Playing Robots in America

Come and listening to the Talk presented by media art Professor Jana Horáková At the American Center in Prague on the 30th of September 2024 at 5 PM local time.

Norticum: Robotics with a human face

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Jana Horakova

The associate professor of media art at Masaryk University Jana Horáková will present the talk “Playing Robots in America” before you can discover the R.U.R.-prints exhibition by Zaven Paré.

INTRODUCTION


In collaboration with The American Center in Prague, Norticum is proud to present an exhibition with R.U.R. prints created by the French artist and roboticist Zaven Paré, and four 15 minutes talks related to R.U.R. and United States.

The opening and the talks will take place on the 30th of September 2024 from 5pm to 7:30pm CET.

Talks by:
Christian Gjørret (Prologue)
Jana Horáková (Act 1)
Zaven Paré (Act 2)
Matej Hoffmann (Act 3)

Exhibition:
Zaven Paré: Robots – Prints in honor of R.U.R. by Karel Čapek 104 years ago

Venue:
The American Center
Tržiště 366, 118 00 Malá Strana, Czechia

There is free entrance.

This exhibition proposes to reveal the robots of R.U.R. as individuals capable of embodying themselves in a gallery of characters from the time of the creation of R.U.R. or a gallery of characters who are still to come.


Playing Robots in America

The talk will address “Americanism” of Karel Čapek play R.U.R. (1920/2021). This characteristic was used by Czech theatre critiques to describe Čapek’s ability to write an adventurous sci-fi play, which resonated strongly in the American cultural context. The R.U.R.’s success in US even contributed to the play’s world fame and turned Čapek (recognized Czech avant-garde artist) into a world-known sci-fi writer. The plot of the play elaborating on Humans–Robots relationship became central motive of the sci-fi since then. The R.U.R.’s influence on sci-fi genre will be illustrated particularly by addressing work of Isaac Asimov (example of technical definition of Robots) and William Gibson’s Neuromancer (representing Robots as products of bioengineering). The aim of the talk is to illustrate viability and universality of the Čapek’s play about Robots.

Bio


Jana Horáková is associate professor of media art at Masaryk University, Brno.

She graduated from the Dance Conservatory in Brno (1990). For five years, she was a member of the ballet ensemble of the National Theatre in Prague. Afterwards, she pursued Theatre Studies at Charles University in Prague and then at Masaryk University in Brno (MA). She received her Ph.D. from the Department of Theatre and Interactive Media at Masaryk University. Since 2004 she teaches the Theory of Interactive Media there.

She has published on robotic art, cultural history of the robot and on software theory. She is also an editor of the Czech-language open-access electronic journal TIM. She lives in Brno.

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